1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to an image discrimination device and an image attribute discrimination method for discriminating among image attributes.
2. Description of the Related Art
Recently, network multifunction peripherals in which copy, facsimile communication, and network communication functions are exerted in one device are becoming increasingly common for space saving.
Some types of network multifunction peripherals include image discrimination devices that can discriminate among image attributes of pieces of image data obtained by scanning a document with a scanner and extract a character region and the like.
Conventionally, a method for extracting the character region by pattern matching in which character information data is used is well known as a method in which an image discrimination device discriminates among image attributes.
However, a large-capacity memory and a large amount of calculation are unfortunately necessary for such a conventional image discrimination device.
That is, because character information data containing printed words is possibly included in the image, a memory in which a large-capacity of character information data can be stored is necessary. Additionally, in the conventional image discrimination device, a considerable amount of calculation including normalization is necessary for pattern matching in which character information data is used.
Therefore, a large-capacity memory and a large amount of calculation are necessary for conventional image discrimination devices, which causes a problem in that a processing time to extract the character region is lengthened.